Finally, a Republican presidential candidate said it: Many of the
ideas floated by the field of White House contenders are just “crazy.”
Gov. John Kasich said it at a rally in Westerville, Ohio, on
Tuesday, using the word crazy numerous times, though without naming names. The
targets of his remarks, however, were obvious.
candidate that says we ought to abolish Medicaid and Medicare. You ever heard
of anything so crazy as that? Telling our people in this country who are
seniors, who are about to be seniors that we’re going to abolish Medicaid and
Medicare?”
Carson has acknowledged that his healthcare voucher plan could gut Medicare and
marginalize Medicaid.
we ought to have a 10 percent flat tax that will drive up the deficit in this
country by trillions of dollars. … Why don’t we have no taxes – just get rid of
them all – and give a chicken in every pot on top of it?”
That reference to Herbert Hoover’s Depression era campaign promise
was apparently sparked by Carson’s tax plan, which has widely been dismissed as
unrealistic.
or 11 million people and pick them up — I don’t know where we’re going to go,
their homes, their apartments — we’re going to pick them up and take ‘em to the
border and scream at them to get out of our country. That’s crazy. That is just
crazy.”
Trump, of course, has called the deportation of all immigrants
living in the country who did not follow the process toward legal residency
status.
leave, I believe, millions of people without adequate health insurance,”
Kasich added.
“What has happened to our party? What has happened the
conservative movement?”
Kasich creates a straw man argument in regard to Medicare and Medicaid, implying that Carson would abolish the programs and leave everyone who now benefits from them twisting in the wind. Liberals did the same thing to Newt Gingrich when he wanted to reform Medicare. If Medicare and Medicaid were abolished it would have to be done incrementally. Or we could just do nothing and wait for the system to become unsustainable and therefore collapse.
Trump says he has no problem with entitlement programs, so it would be interesting to see he and Kasich debating that. One wants to eliminate two major entitlement programs. The other has no problem with them. I wonder how much time would pass before Trump insults Kasich's religion or Kasich decides he's really a Democrat.
I'm not sure I've ever seen a presidential campaign circus like this one.